Now keep in mind I am never competing with this, I just want to teach him to heel for the heck of it, but I'd like it to look at least mostly correct. I started with teaching Tucker to get to my left side by going around the right. Then I did all of the pivot work on a perch (book) which took an extraordinary amount of time (at least I think it did). but we finally got it down, he could pivot both ways and stick to my leg. So I faded the book-smaller book, deck of cards in a box, sticky note. When we did this he had to relearn how to set up beside me but we got there.

So he can set up next to me great. And he can pivot on a perch. And without a perch he is a bit lost. If I pivot left he does fine (well he did yesterday, today he couldn't). If I walk forward or pivot/turn right, away from him, he is super sloppy. He doesn't get that he has to be right next to me. He sort of drifts away. and he'll start walking ahead of me. If I stop he immediately re-sets up but WHILE I'm moving he doesn't stay close to me. If I try to get the food to him before he steps too far ahead his butt swings out.

I have videos that I can post later, I just can't upload them on this computer. Any ideas what I should do? Did I just move too fast? Since his pivot fell completely apart today our next session might be back on a perch to refresh that. But when we start walking, how do I keep him in the right position. Even one step often makes him go too far ahead. I am not clicker training it atm, would a clicker help? I just don't know what to click exactly. I was thinking of maybe using a touch stick to keep him from coming forward. He's never learned to use a touch stick so we'll have to do that first. I am just sort of confused as to what I should do for a dog who doesn't get to stick to your leg.

It sounds like he understands how to pivot, but does not understand heel position. Basically, now that you've taught him how to move, you need to pay into him finding and actively staying in position. You can do this by a lot of games where you move to the side, or backwards, or forward one step. Test him, make it fun, and only ever reward with him next to you, giving you his full attention.

I think too often people rush into moving forward while heeling without building sufficient understanding of the position, and growing value for remaining in it. Though, props to you for doing all the work of teaching a proper pivot. It just sounds like you need to babystep putting it all into motion a bit more.

Here now you can see us struggle lol. I guess I just proceeded too quickly for him. We're going to fix our pivots on the perch and then try taking it one step at a time, see how that goes. I just need to try and make him touch my leg when we walk so there is some concrete criteria for both of us.